last time New York and Washington faced off in 2009, the Nationals were a last-place team and Chien-Ming Wang was a Yankee.

This time around, things are a little different.

Three years have passed and both clubs are in first place, leading arguably the two toughest divisions in baseball. Each team is riding a season high six-game win streak, and while it is still early in the year, the case could be made that we are watching a potential World Series matchup.

Only the LA Dodgers (40-24) have a better record than Washington (38-23) and New York (37-25), but back-to-back series sweeps by both during interleague play leaves fans pointing to these two teams as the best in the bigs. After taking all three games in Boston, the Nationals ...